A NONPARAMETRIC STATISTICAL PROCEDURE FOR RANKING THE OVERALL PERFORMANCE OF SOLAR-RADIATION MODELS AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS

A nonparametric statistical procedure is presented as a solution to th e problem of ranking the overall performance of solar radiation estima tion models at multiple locations. The 11 steps of the computational p rocedure are demonstrated through the use of a worked example. The met hod not only allows models to be ranked based on their relative overal l predictive accuracies but also enables the model tester to assess th e level of statistical significance of the ranked order using critical z values of the normal probability distribution.